escalante

Background After finishing our three day exploration of lower Willow Gulch we had lunch in the shade at Sooner Rocks and then drove the steep 4WD road up Sooner Slide to Fiftymile Bench. The road definitely requires a HC vehicle but isn’t anything too difficult and wasn’t too washed out from...

Background I had intended to repay the kindness of folks on this forum by putting together some TRs before now for my trip to SW Utah this past May, but it was a busy summer and so now I finally had some time to follow through! Normally these trips are day-hike based, since I don’t like...

~4 years ago I first learned about the Escalante Overland Route in a post from Alan Dixon (a.k.a. Adventure Alan). After my first time on Steve Allen's Stevens/Fold loop, I was hooked on his remote, semi-technical routes. I have an alpine rock/remote trad route climbing background, and picked...

Update and warning December 2022: @IntrepidXJ Randy Langstraat reports in October 2022 that the narrow rock chute leading from Hole-in-the-Rock trailhead, down to the shore of Lake Powell, may now be impassable. It was certainly a much trickier descent than I had envisaged, in April 2022, but...

A couple of weeks ago I got my first chance at an actual packrafting trip. After doing a lot of research I decided that the Willow/ Davis Gulch loop looked like the best option. After giving some of the details of the trip to my brother, he also decided to come along. The plan was to meet up in...

Death Hollow. This one has been on my list for sometime now, ever since first coming to know about its existence years ago in a trip report right here on this forum. In fact, I've hatched a handful of trip ideas from browsing reports here. Then last summer happened and my friend @Devin Ashby...

Quarantine makes people do strange things they might not have done otherwise, like an impromptu house purchase and getting married. These things weren't even in discussion pre-Covid. We had a small backyard ceremony in late August, and a week later we packed up and headed west towards southern...

We (my husband, myself, and our four dogs) did the "Lower Escalante Trifecta" as originally reported by @BJett. Thank you @BJett for your post!!! We used a regular map, Gaia, and the picture included in BJett's post, and I did not record anything to save phone battery. The only tricky part is...

Paying a visit to Willow Gulch has been on my radar for a number of years, but given the drive and distance to it, it was something I've continually put off. It was also something I've wanted to take my daughter Willow to, given the shared name. This June, things finally worked out to make it...

March 3-10 2018 The route started off about 40 miles down Hole in the Rock Road and climbs 1500 feet to 50 mile point using a sketchy ridge line. We then walked around 50 point and dropped 1500 feet into Twilight Canyon using another sketchy ridgeline. Then down Twilight till we reach Lake...

Last spring a couple friends and I packrafted a 50 mile section of the Escalante River from Harris Wash to Coyote Gulch. The first day we started with a 10 mile hike down Harris Wash to the Escalante River. From there we floated down the river and camped the first night just before Neon...

After a few years of miscellaneous cancellations and changes of plans, my brother in law and I finally made it out for the weekend. I wanted to head south, and since he is a pilot, we thought it fitting to start from an airstrip. Besides the drive took us to places new to him. The sky was...

May 5-8, 2017 I finished my last exam and I was free. I got together with two friends and we headed down for a weekend of camping and backpacking. We stopped in Torrey for dinner at Slackers, then we headed to find camp for the night on Boulder Mountain. Fortunately, all of the lower reaches...

I've spent most of fall this year running around Utah riding my mountain bike. Not because I'm hugely into mountain biking - yes, it is fun, but more so because my side job of writing trail guides has expanded into also writing up some mountain biking trails around the state. 70 of them to be...

First off, if you haven't already checked out @gnwatts excellent trip report from this same trip, go do it right here. There's not many trips that combine ease, serenity and scenery quite like a well-timed spring or fall trip into Glen Canyon. The timing is the trick though. Hit it right and...

Original trip report can be found at: http://matthewvogt.com/blog/2016/3/11/into-the-belly-of-the-beast I saw a billboard while traveling to places seldom visited. It foretold the promise of an elevation in station from the comfortable perch of motorized water craft. I took this sign at...

Continued from: First Time to the Escalante Canyons, Part 1 3/11/16 After a couple gorgeous days filled with hiking to some of the more "convenient" destinations of the Escalante Canyons area, Friday dawned slightly overcast with a forecast potentially for worse and a plan to take my brother...

October in Glen Canyon. No more monsoons, no more people, and if you're lucky like we were, it's still plenty warm. High 80's with water temps in the mid 70's. Doesn't get much better than that. Our goal for this trip was to get into the canyons of the Escalante. Davis Gulch, Fiftymile, Clear...

I finished my Zion to Capitol Reef Hike back in May. After completing the "Flood Video" I got sidetracked and didn't get a chance to do a full trip report... until now. I'll give you guys a trip overview here and include the "short" video. But, if you have the time and want to dig deeper, check...

A few weeks ago I would have laughed my ass off if you'd told me I'd be backpacking over Memorial Weekend this year. But with all the allergy drama over my knee replacement largely figured out, my recovery has sailed right along. Still too weak for a huge trip, but good for something shorter...